Robby Krieger: ‘Surviving members of The Doors will reunite for Ray Manzarek tribute’

Guitarist announces he and band's John Densmore will regroup for at least one show

Robby Krieger, guitarist in The Doors has announced and fellow surviving member of the group John Densmore will reunite.

He said the pair are planning a live tribute to the band’s keyboard player Ray Manzarek, who died in May aged 74. Krieger says there will be at least one performance, with potential for more. He told Rolling Stone: “We’re going to do at least one show for Ray and have a big send-off. That’s either the start or the end of it, I don’t know.”

It marks a healing in the pair’s relationship. They fell out in 2002 when Krieger and Manzarek began touring as The Doors Of The 21st Century, leading to a lawsuit over the use of band name, and a £25 million countersuit against Densmore for his refusal to sign off on multi-million-dollar licensing of band songs for commercials.

“That’s what you do – if someone sues you, you sue them twice as hard back and hope that they drop the suit,” Krieger said. “It was a very stupid idea. We had the worst lawyers.” The row has now ended, but the lawsuit is the subject of Densmore’s new book, The Doors Unhinged.

Krieger, who admitted to reading about half of the book, said: “He’s the one that got me in the Doors. What am I going to do? I can’t hate him forever. I just wish he had wanted to play with Ray and I back before all this started. That’s when things went bad. We’re talking about it.” A memorial with 150 family and friends took place up in June in Manzarek’s adopted home of Napa, California. Krieger added: “He had a good run. For a rock’n’roller, 74’s a pretty good age.”